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"Christmas Fun" - Memorize Your Lines and Try Not To Bump Into the Furniture.

And never let them cough.

Life's like a play: it's not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters. ~Seneca

“For an actress to be a success, she must have the face of Venus, the brains of Minerva, the grace of Terpsichore, the memory of Macaulay, the figure of Juno, and the hide of a rhinoceros.” ~Ethel BarrymoreI'm Carrie Leigh... a wife, mother, actress, teacher, writer, daughter, sister, aunt and friend. I love cooking, reading, baking, Jesus, sewing, theatre, blueberries, and watching complete seasons of television shows on DVD. Not necessarily in that order.

That's what the cast and crew calls A Christmas Carol. I think an altogether different 'CF' would be more appropriate.

I finished all of the costumes, done, bizzarely enough, while writing scenes with seegrimand mynuet. If you know the show, It's Jacob Marley's Link By Link number, where eight ghosts essentially torture the crap out of Scrooge. The ghosts look scary and all of the costumes I made fit... well enough, anyway.

However, for those of you that don't know, there are unwritten rules in the theatre, for actors. And I'm not talking about the no-brainer stuff, like 'memorize your lines and don't bump into the furniture,' or even the stupid superstitions, like you don't bring an umbrella in and open it up onstage, and you don't say the name of Shakepeare's Scottish play (even though I don't, and certain people on my f-list like to go all capslock-y with it), and you never, ever say 'good luck,' but 'Merde,' or 'break a leg' (which is, incedentally, elle_blessing, what I want to say to you before all your games, but I fear that wouldn't be the same in sports).

The unwritten rule that I'm talking about is none of those. Here it is, a little free advice for those of you that care:

Rule # 1 for actors in theatre: Don't piss off the costumer.

For the costumer is a bitch. She's mean and vindictive. If you piss her off, she's likely to go find the most unflattering color she can, in the hottest, scratchiest of wools, and drape it all over you, telling you all the while how FABULOUS you look.

That said, let me tell you about the little toerag that pissed me off. First of all, he can't remember my name, and instead of being kind about it, and saying, "I'm sorry, what was your name again?" he can't be bothered. This was actually the way it went.

Carrie. This isn't mine, Toerag. (I actually used his name, but for our purposes here...)

Toerag. I don't have a hanger.

Carrie. (points at the z-rack not two feet from him with no less than 50 hangers on it)

Toerag. Oh, I should do it?

Other Ghost Actor. (who has watched this exchange with amusement) I think that'd be best, Toerag.

(Then much later, Carrie walks into the dressing room and finds the costumes that she has worked so hard on wadded up in a corner on the floor.)

Carrie. Whose are these?

Other Ghost Actor. Toerag's.

Carrie. (a 'la 'Newman' from Seinfeld) Toerag!

There's actually more of Toerag and his evils, but I have neither the time nor the energy to type it up. And he's lucky he didn't really hack me off before I constructed his stuff. Ohhhhh, yes. He's lucky.